Beijing on Tuesday reported a record number of Covid-19 cases in nearly three years, a rise that prompted authorities to order schools and restaurants closed while many workers were told to work from home.
Nationwide, the total number of daily cases, including imported cases, exceeded 28,000, with southern Guangdong province and southwest Chongqing city hardest hit, according to health authorities.
China is the last major world economy to implement a strict health policy, known as zero Covid, which aims to do everything possible to prevent contamination and death.
It consists of imposing confinements as soon as the cases appear, quarantines for people who test positive and almost daily PCR tests on the population.
But this strategy, initially effective in slowing the spread of the virus, seems to be losing steam in the face of new variants and is dealing a heavy blow to the economy, isolating China from the rest of the world and provoking strong ennui among the Chinese.
600 areas of Beijing are considered “high risk”
Three elderly Beijing residents with pre-existing conditions died of covid over the weekend, the first virus-related deaths since May.
The authorities in the capital seem to want to avoid for the moment a strict confinement like the one applied in Shanghai in the spring, but nevertheless they have reinforced sanitary measures in recent days. Nearly 600 areas of the capital, including residential buildings, are considered “high risk”, forcing their inhabitants to remain confined to their homes or be transferred to quarantine centers.
Schools have switched to online classes, restaurants, gyms, parks and tourist sites have been closed and employees are being asked to work from home.
On the streets, queues in front of Covid test booths are getting longer, and most public places now require a negative result within 24 hours to enter.
However, the Chinese government revealed several significant relaxations of its zero-covid policy on November 11, including a reduction in quarantine times for travelers arriving from abroad.
Source: BFM TV
